Part one of Christian
Leadership covers the responsibility of Church leadership (pastors, elders,
apostles, prophets, teachers, etc.). It
does not mean that we, as individual believers in the church body, do not have
a responsibility within the church.
While
individual relationships with Jesus will always be vital, we must also see ourselves
as living members of Christ’s body, the church.
We must move from individualism and begin a process of being a part of
the gathering and function of the local congregation within the Church as a
whole. We have one head, who is Jesus
Christ, and one body, the church. Renew
your commitment to the local body of believers.
Seek to build up the church through your works, actions, participation,
and leadership.
Keys to Renewing
Church Life
- Intentionally pursue unity within the body Christ. Do not give place to division or competition. Honor others, seek to be likeminded, and recognize Jesus as the common ground for unity. I Corinthians 1:10 Now I plead with you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment.
- Recognize that division in the church is sin. Turn from jealousy and arguing, which cause division. Seek unity in Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians 3:1-4 And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual people but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ. I fed you with milk and not with solid food; for until now you were not able to receive it, and even now you are still not able; for you are still carnal. For where there are envy, strife, and divisions among you, are you not carnal and behaving like mere men? For when one says, “I am of Paul,” and another, “I am of Apollos,” are you not carnal?
- Understand that the church is the New Testament temple of God. His Spirit dwells in the corporate body, which is composed of many members in whom the Spirit also dwells. Do nothing that will tear down the body, but build on the foundation of Christ Jesus. 1 Corinthians 3:11-17 For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is. If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire. Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are.
- Do not neglect church discipline. 1 Corinthians 5:1-8 It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and such sexual immorality as is not even named among the Gentiles—that a man has his father’s wife! And you are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he who has done this deed might be taken away from among you. For I indeed, as absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged (as though I were present) him who has so done this deed. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when you are gathered together, along with my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. Your glorying is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
- Honor all members of the body, rejoice with them in their successes in the Lord, and care for one another. Utilize your gifts for the good of the whole body. I Corinthians 12:12-27 For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and have all been made to drink into one Spirit. For in fact the body is not one member but many. If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I am not of the body,” is it therefore not of the body? And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I am not of the body,” is it therefore not of the body? If the whole body were an eye, where would be the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where would be the smelling? But now God has set the members, each one of them, in the body just as He pleased. And if they were all one member, where would the body be? But now indeed there are many members, yet one body. And the eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you”; nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” No, much rather, those members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary. And those members of the body which we think to be less honorable, on these we bestow greater honor; and our unpresentable parts have greater modesty, but our presentable parts have no need. But God composed the body, having given greater honor to that part which lacks it, that there should be no schism in the body, but that the members should have the same care for one another. And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; or if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it. Now you are the body of Christ, and members individually.
- Seek to use your spiritual gifts to build up the church and glorify Jesus. Let a word in tongues be interpreted, and let mature leaders judge a prophetic word. DO NOT forbid speaking in tongues; do desire order in their exercise and do earnestly desire to prophesy. I Corinthians 14:26-33, 36-40 How is it then, brethren? Whenever you come together, each of you has a psalm, has a teaching, has a tongue, has a revelation, has an interpretation. Let all things be done for edification. If anyone speaks in a tongue, let there be two or at the most three, each in turn, and let one interpret. But if there is no interpreter, let him keep silent in church, and let him speak to himself and to God. Let two or three prophets speak, and let the others judge. But if anything is revealed to another who sits by, let the first keep silent. For you can all prophesy one by one, that all may learn and all may be encouraged. And the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets. For God is not the author of confusion but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints. Or did the word of God come originally from you? Or was it you only that it reached? If anyone thinks himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things which I write to you are the commandments of the Lord. But if anyone is ignorant, let him be ignorant. Therefore, brethren, desire earnestly to prophesy, and do not forbid to speak with tongues. Let all things be done decently and in order.
Many in the church are not mindful of our responsibility
within the church body. We can’t afford
to be just followers and let church leadership do all the work. Just opening the doors of the sanctuary is
not going to build and grow the church.
It’s not just showing up on Sunday and going home. We must be leaders at our level and carry out
the responsibilities laid out by God and His word. We need assistance from the
Helper to show us and guide us in what we need to know as leaders in the body. Jeremiah
33:3 ‘Call to Me, and I will answer you,
and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.’ Use the power
of the Holy Spirit in this task. Micah 3:8 But truly I am full of power
by the Spirit of the Lord…..
The challenge:
What are we going to do for the Body (church) of Jesus Christ? Jesus was the chief cornerstone Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in
the Scriptures: ‘The stone which the builders rejected Has become the chief cornerstone
Matthew 21:42. Jesus was and is the
foundation for the church. We cannot
afford to compromise the foundation of the church because of church tradition (Matthew
15:6) and not wanting to offend or scare the congregation “If the
foundations are destroyed, What can the righteous do?” Psalm 11:3. This scripture means that IF the
foundations have been destroyed, the righteous will do something about it. The righteous will rise up. Are you ready to rise up because you
certainly can’t hide? Luke 12:2 For
there is nothing covered that will not be revealed, nor hidden
that will not be known. Being a true
believer demands huge responsibility.
Ephesians 4:10-16 He who descended is also the One who ascended far above all
the heavens, that He might fill all things.) And He Himself gave some to be
apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for
the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the
body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge
of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the
fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and
carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the
cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but, speaking the
truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ— 16 from
whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies,
according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes
growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.
Now,
therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with
the saints and members of the household of God, having been built on the
foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief
cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows
into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together for a
dwelling place of God in the Spirit. Ephesians 2:19-22
He who
descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might
fill all things.) And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some
prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of
the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ,
till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of
God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ;
that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with
every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of
deceitful plotting, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow
up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ—from whom the whole body,
joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the
effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body
for the edifying of itself in love. Ephesians 4:10-16
Before He can restore the
foundations of the church, there must first be a tearing down of all that is
not of God and His Spirit.
Blessings to you all,
Tony Sanchez 1-24-16
